Public Servant
To be a public servant
is to peer through steam-coated glasses
at man, woman, teen, in unending lines,
one face after another, most faces naked,
a few rare ones wearing masks like me.
To be a public servant
is to talk kindly
with man, woman, teen, in unending calls,
from the civil, even respectful,
to the needlessly irate
who only get angrier the more
you tell them to calm down, you’re just trying
to help.
To be a public servant
is to spend hours delivering fresh-made pizza,
steaming pasta, soft, gooey garlic cheese bread
and then to get home past ten, stomach growling,
and stick a two-dollar frozen dinner in the microwave.
To be a public servant
is for your roommate to ask you,
while your frozen dinner is heating,
why you’re still wearing latex gloves-
because to you, they’ve become a second skin.
To be a public servant
is the essence of the essential worker;
you are viewed by so many
not as a person but as an object, a butler, indeed a servant,
but not one deserving of any thanks.
To be a public servant
is to remember that your duty
is to provide for others
regardless of if they thank you
regardless of if they tip you
regardless of if they cuss you out
for refusing their expired gift card,
or for putting ice in their beverage
when they didn’t want it,
indeed when you can’t read their minds.
To be a public servant
is to be a person of many masks:
a mask of joy, of patience, of gladness,
of empathy for the enraged customer
who wanted three more pepperonis,
of a self-effacing sense of duty.
To be a public servant
is doing what has to be done
to keep the bills paid
and the economy slowly churning.
is to peer through steam-coated glasses
at man, woman, teen, in unending lines,
one face after another, most faces naked,
a few rare ones wearing masks like me.
To be a public servant
is to talk kindly
with man, woman, teen, in unending calls,
from the civil, even respectful,
to the needlessly irate
who only get angrier the more
you tell them to calm down, you’re just trying
to help.
To be a public servant
is to spend hours delivering fresh-made pizza,
steaming pasta, soft, gooey garlic cheese bread
and then to get home past ten, stomach growling,
and stick a two-dollar frozen dinner in the microwave.
To be a public servant
is for your roommate to ask you,
while your frozen dinner is heating,
why you’re still wearing latex gloves-
because to you, they’ve become a second skin.
To be a public servant
is the essence of the essential worker;
you are viewed by so many
not as a person but as an object, a butler, indeed a servant,
but not one deserving of any thanks.
To be a public servant
is to remember that your duty
is to provide for others
regardless of if they thank you
regardless of if they tip you
regardless of if they cuss you out
for refusing their expired gift card,
or for putting ice in their beverage
when they didn’t want it,
indeed when you can’t read their minds.
To be a public servant
is to be a person of many masks:
a mask of joy, of patience, of gladness,
of empathy for the enraged customer
who wanted three more pepperonis,
of a self-effacing sense of duty.
To be a public servant
is doing what has to be done
to keep the bills paid
and the economy slowly churning.
